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IX PINOCCHIO SELLS HIS SPELLING-BOOK THAT HE MAY GO AND SEE A PUPPET-SHOW S soon as it had done snowing Pinocchio set out for school with his fine S pellingbook under his arm. As he went along he began to imagine a thousand things in his little brain, and to build a thousand castles in the air, one more beautiful than the other. And talking to himself he said: ‘To-day at school I will learn to read at once; then to-morrow I will begin to write, and the day after to-morrow to cipher. ‘Then with my acquirements I will earn a great deal of money, and with the first money I have in my pocket I will immediately buy for my papa a beautiful new cloth coat. But what am I saying? Cloth, indeed! It shall be all made of gold and silver, and it shall have diamond buttons. That poor man really deserves it; for to buy me books and have me taught he has remained in his shirt sleeves. . . . And in this cold! It is only fathers who are capable of such sacrifices! .. .” Whilst he was saying this with great emotion he thought that he heard music in the distance that sounded like fifes and the beating of a big drum; fi-fi-fi, fi-fi-fi, zum, zum, zum, 44
